A new trim board product called Acre is being manufactured by the Modern Mill company in Mississippi. It’s also available in sheet form and decking. This new product contains the same kind of plastic found in PVC trim boards such as Azek, Veranda, Koma and Kleer, but it adds a different ingredient in the form of recycled rice hulls. This changes the property of the material in a number of ways.
I wanted to test this new material in my shop to see how it would look and perform on my jobs, so I asked the company to send some samples. In this video I’ll do a series of tests to see how Acre performs. Like PVC, it is rot free, consistent, and priced about the same. It can be worked with common woodworking tools. But I did discover some very interesting differences between Acre and PVC.
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I also hate the smell and static dust of PVC. This sounds like something I should be looking for in the future. Great video John!
Terrific video. I also like that they're able to use a natural product (rice hulls) that may otherwise go into landfills. Let's see if it catches on.
Super helpful
Thanks for the honest and thorough review, John! I wanted to add a few comments on the staining of ACRE: You can achieve a variety of incredible wood-like finishes by using semi-transparent or semi-solid stains. The ACRE grain you mentioned in your video provides a rich, natural, wood-like finish similar to a hardwood and you can even manipulate and fine tune the stain appearance on ACRE by how you apply it and the amount of coats; rag, brush, sponge, one coat, two coats, etc. Thanks again for taking the time to review ACRE and keep us posted on the things you create with ACRE!
Thanks John. Send a few samples to Matthias Wandel for some real scientific stress tests.. 😛 LOL.
Intriguing product. Lots of promise. The subtle wood grain-like look that kept popping through on the surfaces was very attractive and the coping cut was impressive.
Your Stanley hand plane, is that the cheap contractor version or the expensive version? I been looking at those for awhile Amazon only carries the contractor version and it has mixed reviews. My local Rockler carries a version that is noticeably better built but they want a couple hundos for it. You like the version you have?
I just finished a 6000+ square foot house using Acre trim on the exterior trim, and casing out 45 windows and doors. It was great to work with and looks great. The same builder we frame for used Boral in the previous house which was horrible to work with. I am very impressed with this product and will use it on my own house to replace rotting pine exterior trim.
very helpful comparison, thanks for the video and information about Acre trim
Thanks for this, have you had a chance to use this on site?